Rakosi, Carl, 1903-2004

American poet associated with the Objectivist School of poetry that flourished under the influence of Louis Zukofsky during the 1930s and 40s. Rakosi also worked as a social worker and psychotherapist under the psuedonym Callman Rawley.

Biography

Carl Rakosi was born on November 6, 1903, in Berlin, Germany, and came to the United States with his father and stepmother in 1910. He received his B.A. (1924) and M.A. (1926) from the University of Wisconsin, and completed his Masters of Social Work at the University of Pennsylvania in 1940. He married Leah Jaffe in 1939.

During the thirties, Rakosi was a member of a group of poets called "The Objectivists," which included Louis Zukofsky, Charles Reznikoff, and George Oppen. Between 1939 and 1965, he stopped writing in order to devote himself to social work and psychotherapy. It was not until 1965, at the urging of Andrew Crozier, that Rakosi started to write again.

Rakosi practiced social work and psychotherapy as Callman Rawley, his legally adopted professional name. Between 1945 and his retirement in 1968, Rakosi was Executive Director of the Jewish Family and Children's Service in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He also conducted a private practice in psychotherapy between 1955 and 1971.

As an important Objectivist poet, Rakosi's style of writing can be summarized by Stanley Cooperman's comment:

what Rakosi has, delightfully, is an ability to translate

emotion into objects, tastes, smells: and these, in turn,

are completely familiar- except that the familarity occurs

in unexpected juxtapositions of sound and theme...

Rakosi's work is at once irreverent and serious; highly

intellectual and simplistic.

His published works include SELECTED POEMS (1941), AMULET (1967), ERE-VOICE (1971), EX CRANIUM, NIGHT (1975), MY EXPERIENCE IN PARNASSUS (1977), SPIRITUS I (1983), and COLLECTED POEMS (1986), THE EARTH SUITE (1997), and THE OLD POET'S TALE (1999). Besides his literary work, including poetry, essays and book reviews, Rakosi also published articles and reviews on social work and psychology.

Rakosi continues to be involved in the publishing of his collected works, and to correspond with younger writers interested in his and other Objectivists' work.

In 2003, His 100th Birthday celebration was marked by several poets--including Anselm Hollo, Lyn Hejinian, George Evans and others--reading from their own work, at Rakosi's request. Until his death on June 24, 2004, Rakosi continued to develop new poems and to correspond with younger writers interested in his and other Objectivists' work.